Yes, I consider myself an anxiety survivor because there was a point in my life where I felt too terrified to be in the world, and yet, here I am, grounded and functioning again. But that doesn’t mean I don’t still struggle. And that’s okay.
The point is, every time I spiraled through darkness but then found a landing place, I learned something new. So each time I fell into the dark, I gained a larger skill set for crawling out.
For example, in my 20’s, I suffered from debilitating panic attacks. Because it was my first major plummet into a terrifying, black hole, I had no reference point, no hope. I literally had no idea where to turn for help, and the more I fought my fear, the more I fed it. Luckily I found a counselor who helped me feel a little less crazy, and from there I began small steps toward healing. But it took time.
Then came my 30’s, and the headway I’d been making came to a halt. For whatever reason, my brain decided, out of nowhere, to torment me again – this time in the form of social anxiety. However, because of my previous success, I believed there must be a way to work through it, even though I was still grasping at how that might happen. I started by using what I’d learned in my 20’s and added in some deep visualization work that really expanded my grounding, and I found my way back out.
And then, you guessed it, a few years later, anxiety found yet a new way to assault me, this time taking the form of obsessive thinking, and let me tell you, this one was a doozy. I would define my type of obsessive thinking like this: when a person fears that they are thinking or feeling something that could hurt someone they love, so that every time they have what is actually a natural feeling, were it not amplified by anxiety, it feeds this fear. For instance, you meet a random person, and you feel a flutter of attraction. But instead of brushing it off as a normal human response, you suddenly fear that you are feeling more for this person than you feel for your current partner. I’m not talking about situations where you’re in an unhappy relationship and are actually out on the prowl. I’m talking about the very normal “noticing” of whichever gender you are physically attracted to. If you suffer from obsessive thinking, you could very well turn yourself into a basket case over thoughts and feelings that are not to be taken seriously. It’s a horrible chokehold to be in.
But guess what? By using strategies I’d learned through the years, and adding some new ones, I found my way out of the nightmare.
Each time I spiraled into what was becoming the familiar pit of despair, I found my way out. And each time, I strengthened my skill set, and the rebound time was shorter as I regrouped and remembered what to do. And this resilience, in turn, lead to a strengthening in my belief that, even though I had fallen again, darn it, I would get out. That, my friends, is survival.
If you’d like to learn more about the specific strategies that saved me, be sure to sign up for a free download of my e-book: Five Ways Out of Your Funk. It will at least get you started.